Friday, September 27, 2013

130926 Main Ingredient's MENU - Cape Malay Curry cook-off, John Collins trade tasting, This week’s recipe- the recipes from the cook-off

MENU
Main Ingredient’s weekly E-Journal
Gourmet Foods & Ingredients
Eat In Guide’s Five time Outstanding Outlet Award Winner
+27 21 439 3169 / +27 83 229 1172
A quiet evening in the Alfred Basin, V&A Waterfront
In this week’s MENU:                                
*    Cape Malay Curry cook-off
*    John Collins trade tasting
*    This week’s recipe: the recipes from the cook-off
Follow this link to see our Main Ingredient blogs, because to tell our whole story here would take too much space. Click on Bold words in the text of this edition to open links to pictures, blogs, pertinent websites or more information. Follow us on Twitter: @mainingmenu
This week’s Product menu: Ottolenghi continues to inspire! Spice mixtures like za’atar and ras el hanout are very popular, as is sumac, one of his favourite ingredients. We also have delicious treats for the times when you just want to heat and eat: Confit duck, French beans in goose fat and Garbure – a pot à feu of duck confit and vegetables. We can also get you ready made cassoulet - and don’t forget the superb French patés. Our online shop shows our range of rare and exciting products which you are unlikely to find elsewhere in South Africa. See it here
Our market activities Come and visit us at the Old Biscuit Mill’s wonderfully exciting, atmospheric Neighbourgoods Market, as always, this Saturday and every Saturday between 09h00 and 14h00. Tip: Some visitors tell us how they struggle to find parking. It’s quite easy if you know how. Click here for a map which shows where we park.
Cape Malay Curry cook-off     For several years, Muratie and DuToitskloof Wineries have held an annual cook-off competition using one famed local dish. This year, it was the turn of a traditional Cape Malay Curry and we were delighted to be invited to come and taste both curries and then vote on our favourite. Each was accompanied by a wine from the producer of the food, so you could also see which wine you preferred with the dish. We drank the Muratie Laurens Kampher 2012 white blend and the Du Toitskloof 2013 Beaukett, an aromatic blend of muscat de frontignan, chenin blanc and gewürztraminer.
There was some quite illustrious company attending. We met Benny Masekwameng, one of the judges from MasterChef SA, and Arnold Tanzer, chef extraordinaire and Culinary Producer of MasterChef SA, whom we know from our shop, was also there. Cass Abrahams, the renowned author of Cape Malay cookbooks, had been invited to give her opinion on the dishes, as was Myrna Robins, who writes for Independent Newspapers. It was a lovely, informal and friendly lunch with the media and 19 of the people enjoying the feast had a vote. The winner, by a margin of 3 votes, was Muratie’s co-owner and cook, Kim Melck. Her restaurant slow roasted lamb shanks (not curried) are a good incentive to visit the farm and enjoy them with the wines.
The curries were very different from each other, even though they both used lamb shanks. Du Toitskloof’s was a sweet and sour rendition, which Cass Abrahams said was more in the region of the classic Cape Malay style, but did not have any tamarind in it, as the cook used vinegar and white wine. The Muratie curry – which we both voted for – was hot and spicy and the lamb was very succulent. Both were served with sambals, which Cass Abrahams said would not happen in Cape Malay culture, so all of us who grew up eating sambals with curry got that from the British/Indian tradition at the Cape. And, she said, the use of chilli was not correct as Cape Malay curries use no heat, just spices like turmeric, coriander, cassia, cumin and cloves mixed into a traditional curry powder. For our palates the addition of fresh banana in yogurt was welcome, as were the chutneys and sambals, as they add complexity and texture to curries. As both Indonesia and Malaya and other Asian countries that were part of the Dutch East Indies use chillies in their curries, we suspect that the tradition died out here because chillies were scarce or could not be found here when the Cape Malay population arrived. Both wines went very well with the curries, but the winner at our end of the table was the DuToitskloof Beaukett, whose sweet fruit was a good match for the spice. Click here to see the photographs
John Collins trade tasting      John Collins represents a few of the best wine farms in the Cape and now has taken on some Belgian beers, so last night’s trade tasting was always going to be pretty special, and not a little dangerous with possible over-imbibing. What was also thrown into the mix were some of the best and most luxurious canapés we have ever had at a tasting, produced non-stop by the kitchens at Den Anker, where the tasting was held between 3.30 and 6.30. Raw marinated tuna, bitterballen, duck foie on toast with a shard of caramel, smoked salmon tartar, mini caprese sticks and huge curried prawns wrapped in Kataifi pastry, all went well with the wines and beers we tasted. And then there were waffles with ice cream and strawberries and Belgian Chocolates..
There was not one bad or dubious wine, in fact Lynne’s tasting notes are covered in superlatives, but we thought the best thing we could do was to recommend our favourites from each farm.
Diemersfontein produced a juicy Cabernet Sauvignon with a backing of dark toasted wood; their Carpe Diem Chenin Blanc is superb, full of limey citrus, pineapple, green apples and pears with great balance and depth. Take note of the Carpe Diem 2011 Pinotage Reserve which won the Old Mutual Trophy and buy the Thokozani white blend of Chenin, Chardonnay and Viognier. This is a big wine, full of minerality and nods to a Chablis style.
At the Jordan table, we loved the newly released 2013 Sauvignon Blanc. It has superb flavours of blackcurrant leaves, some tropical and some classic green fig flavours. The unoaked Chardonnay is also a stunner with fresh lime and melon finishing buttery and a full mouthful of pleasure. A food wine for sure. We thought the barrel fermented 2012 Chardonnay needs a little more time, but will be amazing when it starts to ‘speak’ and the 2012 barrel fermented Chenin Blanc is deep and rich and should win some awards. The Nine Yards chardonnay is simply brilliant, big and rich and will age very well. John loves The Outlier Sauvignon blanc, with its rich mineral overtones and The Prospector Shiraz, which is a favourite when he takes tour clients to lunch at Jardine restaurant on the Jordan estate. A tray of duck foie paté came by as we were tasting the Mellifera noble late harvest – a sublime coincidence!
And the wine of the tasting was 2009 Jordan Cobbler’s Hill. Herbal notes on the cassis and cherry nose followed through to full, sweet, supple fruit with a licorice end. Soft as silk and velvet, this might well become a Birthday wine for next August.
Kleinood’s Tamboerskloof 2009 Syrah unfolds in the mouth with warm rich berries and spice. Their Tamboerskloof Viognier is the best they have ever produced, full of peaches and cream without any suggestion of harsh wood. Lynne would drink this until the cows come home.
All of Newton Johnson’s Pinots are showing beautifully, but especially the Walker Bay 2012. Like violet macaroons on the nose, full of burgundy fruit flavours with a touch of spice and as they put it, cashmere-like tannins. The 2012 Family Vineyards Pinot is like suede leather on the nose, very elegant and hiding a little, but just about to burst into life. The Full Stop Rock 2010 blend of Syrah, grenache and mourvedre just rocks. A new discovery for us is Resonance, their 2012 Sauvignon blanc/Semillon blend and we think they have produced another winning wine. It needs time, like Cape Point’s Isliedh, but has all the bones.
Thelema Sutherland’s 2010 Viognier Rousanne impressed a lot. Rousanne is a grape we appear to be able to grow successfully and it adds something quite different when blended with the Viognier, making it more savoury. It will be great with warm summer dishes which have a kick of hot spice. Sadly we didn’t manage to taste any of their reds this time, but we know the Syrah well and it is very good.
We tasted Springfield’s Life From Stone earlier this year at Wine Concepts’ Sauvignon festival and loved it then. It is now even better and is showing all the characteristics we have come to expect from this lovely powerful wine: gooseberries, elderflower, green figs, with a mineral and flint background. How far can it go? The Special Cuvée is starting to wake up as well and we will be watching its progress over the year. The unwooded 2011 Wild Yeast Chardonnay is sweet and rich and the Barrel fermented 2009 “Method Ancienne” Chardonnay is complex and intriguing. Of the red wines, we tasted the Whole Berry, a delicious naturally fermented Bordeaux style blend and The Work Of Time 2006, also a Bordeaux (Merlot, Cabernet sauvignon, Cabernet franc, Petit Verdot) blend, which has benefited from slow fermentation and long maturation – you can enjoy it now, but it will also enjoy a few years in a quiet corner.
Peter Bayly’s white port is a superb sweet ‘wine’ to serve as an accompaniment to rich patés or as an aperitif (good on the rocks or, as Peter says, as a long drink with tonic), while his Cape Late Bottled Vintage Port is a classic. You can taste them at the Neighbourgoods Market – his table is next to ours.
Lynne tasted some of the Belgian beers just before the tasting closed and they are very good indeed, some light weissbier, some fruity and fun and some darker beers – the Belgians probably make a wider variety of beers than any other nation – and most are made naturally (Stella Artois doesn’t feature in our list of favourites). We hope to get them to do a tasting for our Wine Club in the future and will then be able to write about them more authoritatively.
Photos from the tasting are here – Muggins forgot his camera battery on its charger, so these photographs and the headline photograph were all taken with his Nokia Lumia 920. Where would we be without smartphones?
This week’s recipe     The recipes from the cook-off, reproduced with permission of Posy Hazell, who co-ordinated it. We thought you might like to try this for yourself.
MURATIE TEAM RECIPE Cape Malay lamb curry served Onion Chutney and Banana Yoghurt
Recipe for 6 people
1kg lamb - 2 TBSP Lalla’s special lamb masala - 2 TBSP crushed green ginger/garlic paste - 1 level tsp salt
1 tsp turmeric - 10 curry leaves - 6 cardamom pods - 5 cinnamon sticks - 5 cloves - 1 tsp cumin - 1 tsp coriander powder - 2 TBSP oil to mix -2 medium sized onions - 2 tomatoes - Some chopped fresh coriander - 1 tsp garam masala - 1½ bananas chopped –
1 cup of buttermilk - 1 cup of apricot jam
Fry onions in 4 TBSP oil with masala, turmeric, crushed green ginger/garlic paste, salt and the seeds i.e. cloves, cinnamon etc. Rub coriander and cumin powder into the meat. When onions are golden brown, add the meat together with the curry leaves. Braise for 5-10 minutes, and then cook on medium heat. Add tomatoes and potatoes if required. ½ hour later, add garam masala and coriander leaves. Add up to 1½ cups water when required. A delicious curry is now ready to be served with the Salsa and the Banana Yoghurt.
Chutney: 1 red onion finely sliced - 1 small cucumber diced - 4 TBSP brown vinegar - 2 TBSP sugar - 1 tsp salt - Fresh mint
Soak the onion in the vinegar, sugar, and salt solution for a few minutes, then mix in the diced cucumber. Just before serving add a tsp of freshly shredded mint.
BANANA YOGHURT : Chop up 3 ripe firm bananas and mix with a cup of double Greek yoghurt


DU TOITSKLOOF TEAM RECIPE Cape Malay Lamb Curry served with Pineapple Sambal and Coriander Chutney - Recipe for 4 Lamb Shanks
Marinade:
½ cup apple cider vinegar - ¼ cup oil - 1½ TBSP garam masala - 2 TBSP balsamic vinegar - 2 tsp salt
Stir well and marinade shanks overnight. Remove shanks from marinade – keep marinade aside.
Salt generously with coarse salt on both sides. Heat oven to 230°C, place shanks in open roasting pan, bake for 20-25 min to seal the meat
Wet Mixture: 1 onion chopped - 1 cup cherry tomatoes - ? cup sliced ginger - 8 gloves garlic, peeled - ½ cup of water
Blend all the ingredients together, keep aside
Spice Mixture: 1 onion chopped - 3 TBSP clarified butter
Fry until brown. Add: 1 tsp ground pepper - 1 tsp mustard seeds - 1 tsp paprika - 1 tsp ground cinnamon - 1 tsp ground cumin - 1 tsp garam masala - 1 tsp turmeric - 1 tsp ground coriander -
4 cloves - 3 cardamom pods - Pinch chilli flakes - Roast together with onions until fragrant.
Add Wet Mixture. Add Marinade, bring to the boil, add meat . Add peel of 1 orange Add 4 tsp brown sugar. Add ½ cup chicken stock Add ½ cup white wine Cook slowly for 3 hours until meat is tender
Season with salt and pepper. A delicious curry is now ready to be served with Pineapple Sambal and Coriander Chutney
PINEAPPLE SAMBAL: 1 medium pineapple - 2 green chillies - 10ml sugar - 2ml cumin
Mix together in blender
CORIANDER CHUTNEY: 1 bunch fresh coriander leaves - 2 green chillies - 1 red pepper - 2 garlic cloves - 1 tomato - 2ml salt - 60ml fresh lime juice - 2ml cumin. Mix together in blender
Buying from us On Line   We have a lot of fun putting MENU together each week and, of course, doing the things we write about, but making it possible for you to enjoy rare and wonderful gourmet foods is what drives our business. We stock a good range of ingredients and delicious ready-made gourmet foods. You can contact us by email or phone, or through our on line shop. We can send your requirements to you anywhere in South Africa. Please do not pay until we have confirmed availability and invoiced you, then you pay and then we deliver or post. When you make an eft payment, make sure that it says who you are. Use the form on the website to email us your order. Click here to see our OnLine Shop.
There is a huge and rapidly growing variety of interesting things to occupy your leisure time here in the Western Cape. There are so many interesting things to do in our world of food and wine that we have made separate list for each month for which we have information. To see what’s happening in our world of food and wine (and a few other cultural events), visit our Events Calendar. It needs updating and we’ll do that tomorrow. All the events are listed in date order and we already have a large number of exciting events to entertain you right through the year.
Learn about wine and cooking We receive a lot of enquiries from people who want to learn more about wine. Cathy Marston and The Cape Wine Academy both run wine education courses, some very serious and others more geared to fun. You can see details of Cathy’s WSET and other courses here and here and the CWA courses here.
Chez Gourmet in Claremont has a programme of cooking classes. We plan to visit their French establishment after Vinexpo. A calendar of their classes can be seen here. Pete Ayub, who makes our very popular Prego sauce, runs evening cooking classes at Sense of Taste, his catering company in Maitland. We can recommend them very highly, having enjoyed his seafood course. Check his programme here. Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has cooking classes in Fish Hoek and conducts cooking tours to Normandy. You can see more details here. Emma Freddi runs the Enrica Rocca cooking courses at her home in Constantia. Brett Nussey’s Stir Crazy courses are now being run from Dish Food and Social’s premises in Main Road Observatory (opposite Groote Schuur hospital). Lynn Angel runs the Kitchen Angel cooking school and does private dinners at her home. She holds hands-on cooking classes for small groups on Monday and Wednesday evenings. She trained with Raymond Blanc, and has been a professional chef for 25 years. More info here






26th September 2013
Remember - if you can’t find something, we’ll do our best to get it for you, and, if you’re in Cape Town or elsewhere in the country, we can send it to you! Check our online shop for details and prices.
PS If a word or name is in bold type and underlined, click on it for more information
Phones: +27 21 439 3169 / 083 229 1172 / 083 656 4169
Postal address: 60 Arthurs Rd, Sea Point 8005
Our Adamastor & Bacchus© tailor-made Wine, Food and Photo tours take small groups (up to 6) to specialist wine producers who make the best of South Africa’s wines. Have fun while you learn more about wine and how it is made! Tours can be conducted in English, German, Norwegian or Dutch flavoured Afrikaans.
Recommendations of products and outside events are not solicited or charged for, and are made at the authors’ pleasure. All photographs, recipes and text used in these newsletters and our blogs are © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus. Our restaurant reviews are usually unsolicited. We prefer to pay for our meals and not be paid in any way by anyone. Whether we are invited or go independently, we don’t feel bad if we say we didn’t like it. Honesty is indeed our best policy. While every effort is made to avoid mistakes, we are human and they do creep in occasionally, for which we apologise. Our Avast! ® Anti-Virus software is updated at least daily and our system is scanned continually for viruses.

This electronic journal has been sent to you because you have personally subscribed to it or because someone you know has asked us to send it to you or forwarded it to you themselves. Addresses given to us will not be divulged to any person or organisation. We collect them only for our own promotional purposes. We own our mailing software and keep our mailing list strictly confidential. If you wish to be added to our mailing list, please click here to send us a message and if you wish to be removed from our mailing list, please click here to send us a message.

Thursday, September 26, 2013

John Collins' trade wine tasting at Den Anker

Gary Jordan and Louise Genis on the Jordan table take requests and questions
Jeanette Bruwer of Springfield Estate talking to a customer
Taste, swirl, swallow or spit?  Everyone enjoying the atmosphere at Den Anker restaurant in the Waterfront
Discussion about the wine on the Thelema Sutherland table
Some of the canapés on offer:
Bitterballen – mini warm deep fried meat croquettes served with a German style mustard
Salmon tartare on croutons, with topped with mini onion sprouts , needed salt
Duck foie with a shard of caramel on mini toasts – a brilliant match with the sweet wines
Spicy hot curried prawns wrapped in Greek Kataifi pastry and deep fried.  Huge prawns and a serious sizzle.
Jewelled raw tuna marinated in soy and sprinkled with chopped pistachio nuts
The lovely ladies on Kleinood’s stand
Gordon Newton Johnson pours his Resonance Sauvignon/Semillon blend for Louise and Mark Herd
Deon Joubert on the Diemersfontein stand, having a giggle with John
Waffles, syrup and ice cream with strawberries - Belgium is famous for them
Do have a Belgian chocolate or two..
We leave as evening sets in and paying customers take back the restaurant
The waterfront in the evening glow. This is the famous Time Ball, which gave masters of ships in earlier times an accurate check for their chronometers
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2013



Thursday, September 19, 2013

130918 Main Ingredient's MENU - 30th Blaauwklippen Blending Competition Awards, Heritage Day, Caramel sauce

MENU
Main Ingredient’s weekly E-Journal
Gourmet Foods & Ingredients
Eat In Guide’s Five time Outstanding Outlet Award Winner
+27 21 439 3169 / +27 83 229 1172
Cormorants face the gathering storm
In this week’s MENU:                                
*    30th Blaauwklippen Blending Competition Awards
*    Heritage Day
*    Caramel sauce
Follow this link to see our Main Ingredient blogs, because to tell our whole story here would take too much space. Click on Bold words in the text of this edition to open links to pictures, blogs, pertinent websites or more information. Follow us on Twitter: @mainingmenu
This week’s Product menu: Truffles are the flavour of the moment and truffle related products are bmoving out as fast as we can replenish our stock. Must be the wintry weather! In addition, we continue to receive enquiries for Mediterranean and Middle Eastern products like sumac and za’atar and for Puy lentils, black beans, beluga lentils and other pulses. We do have all of these currently in stock. We surmise many of you are using Ottolenghi cookbooks! Our online shop shows our range of rare and exciting products which you are unlikely to find elsewhere in South Africa. See it here
Our market activities Come and visit us at the Old Biscuit Mill’s wonderfully exciting, atmospheric Neighbourgoods Market, as always, this Saturday and every Saturday between 09h00 and 14h00. Tip: Some visitors tell us how they struggle to find parking. It’s quite easy if you know how. Click here for a map which shows where we park.
A relatively quiet week has given us a chance to catch our breath and spend a little time doing essential things around the house and entertain a few friends to a dinner party. Off again tomorrow to Muratie for the Cape Winelands Cooking Challenge, more about which next week.
30th Blaauwklippen Blending Competition Awards     If you are in a wine club that meets regularly, you probably know about this annual completion. If you don’t, be sure to enter your club next year. Or you could use the time in the next year to form your own club. You can get details on the Blaauwklippen web site. For a small charge they send you a box of wine and instructions on what to blend and how to blend it.
We have certainly taken part several times over the years as member of our wine club, the Oenophiles and had great fun doing the blending of the bottles of different Blaauwklippen wines into an acceptable blend for Blaauwklippen to market and sell. One thing it does illustrate very clearly is how complicated and how finite it is to blend wine. We have found that it teaches wine lovers not to be so blasé about the wine they are drinking.
We attended the award ceremony at Blaauwklippen last Friday, where we met all the possible winners, and many of the people responsible for starting this competition, who were really surprised at how quickly the years have gone by. Walter Finlayson, Alan Mullins and Angela Lloyd told us how it had started and how it had evolved over the years to become the success that it is. This year, they decided to create a small side competition and invited all the media to enter their blends and we took part in this, sadly without success. The winners were the Natalia Wine Society from Durban and this is their third time of winning, so these people obviously know what they are doing. Interestingly there are two other clubs who have also won the award three times. The media award was taken by winemag.co.za. Congratulations to all. Click here to see the photos and what we had for lunch.
Here’s your Heritage Day     Steve Jeffrey of The Charcuterie will be releasing a once off limited release of two unique boerewors’ available on Saturday only at The Neighbourgoods Market. As he says, “To celebrate our national heritage on National Braai Day, what better ingredients than Brandy & Coke and Mrs Ball’s Chutney and Old Brown Sherry!!”
1.    Brandy & Coke with fragrant sweet spice notes and roasted coriander.
  1. Mrs Ball’s Chutney with warm piquant spice notes laden with apricots poached in old Brown Sherry
Their normal range of seven unique fresh sausages will also be available. Come and try and buy.
Special things to do on Heritage Day can be found in our Events Calendar
Recipe      We had a dinner party this week and Lynne made one of our favourite desserts, a classic Tart Tatin. We tried another variation this week and used good apples and a small tin of pineapple rings. Lynne arranged them in the centre with a cherry in each ring. We had this recently at The French Connection and particularly liked the caramel sauce they served with it. It is much easier to make than it seems, if a little risky as making caramel can be hot and dangerous. Just be careful.
Caramel sauce
200g / 1cup white sugar - 90g butter - 120g cream
Put the sugar in a thick bottomed deep pan and cook on medium until it melts. Keep swirling the pan so that the sugar can cook evenly, but do not stir or it will crystallize.
Once the sugar has melted and reached a deep brown colour, move it off the heat and add the butter all at once. It will foam up, so be careful. Stir until it's completely melted into the caramel. Then pour in the cream - it may still be foaming - and whisk until you have a good sauce.
You can bottle this and keep it in the fridge for about two weeks. Warm slightly if you want to serve it with dessert. Or you can pour it over a cake, ice cream, tarts, crumbles, pancakes, brownies, waffles even toast., there are endless delights.
If you want a salted caramel sauce, stir in 1 teaspoon of sea salt.
Buying from us On Line   We have a lot of fun putting MENU together each week and, of course, doing the things we write about, but making it possible for you to enjoy rare and wonderful gourmet foods is what drives our business. We stock a good range of ingredients and delicious ready-made gourmet foods. You can contact us by email or phone, or through our on line shop. We can send your requirements to you anywhere in South Africa. Please do not pay until we have confirmed availability and invoiced you, then you pay and then we deliver or post. When you make an eft payment, make sure that it says who you are. Use the form on the website to email us your order. Click here to see our OnLine Shop.
There is a huge and rapidly growing variety of interesting things to occupy your leisure time here in the Western Cape. There are so many interesting things to do in our world of food and wine that we have made separate list for each month for which we have information. To see what’s happening in our world of food and wine (and a few other cultural events), visit our Events Calendar. It needs updating and we’ll do that tomorrow. All the events are listed in date order and we already have a large number of exciting events to entertain you right through the year.
Learn about wine and cooking We receive a lot of enquiries from people who want to learn more about wine. Cathy Marston and The Cape Wine Academy both run wine education courses, some very serious and others more geared to fun. You can see details of Cathy’s WSET and other courses here and here and the CWA courses here.
Chez Gourmet in Claremont has a programme of cooking classes. We plan to visit their French establishment after Vinexpo. A calendar of their classes can be seen here. Pete Ayub, who makes our very popular Prego sauce, runs evening cooking classes at Sense of Taste, his catering company in Maitland. We can recommend them very highly, having enjoyed his seafood course. Check his programme here. Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has cooking classes in Fish Hoek and conducts cooking tours to Normandy. You can see more details here. Emma Freddi runs the Enrica Rocca cooking courses at her home in Constantia. Brett Nussey’s Stir Crazy courses are now being run from Dish Food and Social’s premises in Main Road Observatory (opposite Groote Schuur hospital). Lynn Angel runs the Kitchen Angel cooking school and does private dinners at her home. She holds hands-on cooking classes for small groups on Monday and Wednesday evenings. She trained with Raymond Blanc, and has been a professional chef for 25 years. More info here





18th September 2013
Remember - if you can’t find something, we’ll do our best to get it for you, and, if you’re in Cape Town or elsewhere in the country, we can send it to you! Check our online shop for details and prices.
PS If a word or name is in bold type and underlined, click on it for more information
Phones: +27 21 439 3169 / 083 229 1172 / 083 656 4169
Postal address: 60 Arthurs Rd, Sea Point 8005
Our Adamastor & Bacchus© tailor-made Wine, Food and Photo tours take small groups (up to 6) to specialist wine producers who make the best of South Africa’s wines. Have fun while you learn more about wine and how it is made! Tours can be conducted in English, German, Norwegian or Dutch flavoured Afrikaans.
Recommendations of products and outside events are not solicited or charged for, and are made at the authors’ pleasure. All photographs, recipes and text used in these newsletters and our blogs are © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus. Our restaurant reviews are usually unsolicited. We prefer to pay for our meals and not be paid in any way by anyone. Whether we are invited or go independently, we don’t feel bad if we say we didn’t like it. Honesty is indeed our best policy. While every effort is made to avoid mistakes, we are human and they do creep in occasionally, for which we apologise. Our Avast! ® Anti-Virus software is updated at least daily and our system is scanned continually for viruses.

This electronic journal has been sent to you because you have personally subscribed to it or because someone you know has asked us to send it to you or forwarded it to you themselves. Addresses given to us will not be divulged to any person or organisation. We collect them only for our own promotional purposes. We own our mailing software and keep our mailing list strictly confidential. If you wish to be added to our mailing list, please click here to send us a message and if you wish to be removed from our mailing list, please click here to send us a message.

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Blaauwklippen Blending Competition awards lunch

Each year the label for the bottle is changed. This is the bright and fun painting of the label done by artist Frans Groenewald.  They will fill in the names of the winners when the label is printed
A welcome glass of Blaauwklippen White Zinfandel
Some interesting canapés:
Duck in puff pastry
Tiny feta and spinach quiches
The best were pancakes filled with smoked salmon and topped with a dot of cream cheese and salmon caviar with a sprig of dill
Alan Mullins, one of the originators of the blending competition with PR whizz Nicolette Waterford
Prizes?  No, gifts for all attending, which included some beautiful Vitria wine glasses and a magnum of the winning wine
Two long tables sit down for lunch and the awards
The menu for the day
Wine Maker and GM of Blaauwklippen Rolf Zeitvogel tells us the history of the competition and that the wine we will drink with our lunch will be the as yet unidentified winning blend
Our starter of chicken ballontine stuffed with olives, peppers and chicken farce, accompanied by a bangle of crisp cheese, atop a moist mushroom and feta quiche. The chicken was a little dry, but the stuffing was deliciously complex. Served with Blaauwklippen 2013 Chenin Blanc
Walter Finlayson, past winemaker at Blaauwklippen, tells us about his role in the formation of the competition before he went on to Glen Carlou
Anel Grobler of Spit or Swallow tweeting the awards to her followers
Rolf Zeitvogel and Walter Finlayson
Rolf chats to John, who was from the first wine club to win 30 years ago. They are also from Durban
Dave Hudson of Cape Town represented another previous winner

Dave and Janet Hudson

Cape Wine Master Clive Torr has been a judge of the competition over the years
Angela Lloyd tells us how the competition mushroomed from the original entries. They never imagined how long it would last and how enthusiastically it would be supported, by the sponsors and the wine clubs
Natalie Campbell of Blaauwklippen, PA to Rolf Zeitvogel and co-ordinator of the competition
Nicolette Waterford. Her public relations company, Waterford Communications, organised this very well run event
Media making notes: Chris von Ulmenstein and Norman McFarlane
Suzette Biermann, representing finalist Oude Molen Wynkring from Potchefstroom in the North-West Province
Nominee Laurence Davies of the Natalia Wine Society thought the wine tasted a bit familiar
Dwayne and Helen Embery, represented Web Wine Society from Port Elizabeth in the Eastern Cape
Alan Mullins enjoying lunch and the awards
Sasha van Zyl of  winemag.co.za, who won the media award
Blaauwklippen's assistant winemaker, Albert Basson

And here is the winning wine for us to taste
Our main course was an extremely tender roasted lamb rump on a smoked potato purée, (thank heavens not over-smoked) with a deep and rich black olive jus and perfectly cooked baby vegetables  This was served with an anchovy and caper butter, which Lynne felt added too much salty contrast to the rich sweet lamb, so she added only a tiny dab
 Denise Huff of Vitria Glass, one of the sponsors of the awards
Seated at the end of the table are the four most valuable members of staff from the cellar. They have to organise all the bottling of the wines to be blended, their packaging and dispatch to the clubs. Then they have to assemble the blends which are entered for tasting, as well as make up the final winning blend. Work well done
Walter and Jill Finlayson
First award is the Media award to winemag.co.za. Receiving it from Rolf is Sasha van Zyl
Natalie
And the award for the best blend 2013 goes to Laurence Davies of Natalia Wine Society in Durban
He is delighted and amused that he spotted it when he tasted the winning wine with lunch
Lots of smiles from the award winners
Here, assembled, are all the finalists and the winners with Rolf and Albert
Laurence and Jenny Davies with Rolf Zeitvogel
Rolf with Helen and Dwayne Embery
and with the Biermanns from Potchefstroom
Laurence and Jenny, proudly taking the trophy home
And, finally, our dessert - soft stewed and macerated pear with a deeply delicious chocolate mousse, slices of chocolate Madeira cake, Chantilly cream and a strawberry vodka jelly, served with a glass of Blaauwklippen Zinfandel Noble Late Harvest
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2013